A special report by Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting (DAFOH) put the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) practice of harvesting organs from living prisoners of conscience into the spotlight on International Human Rights Day 2022, observed on Dec. 10.

“This unprecedented evil, the state-sanctioned, large-scale killing of vulnerable prisoners of conscience committed by a totalitarian regime, is not only a crime against humanity, but also a threat to humankind,” states the report, titled “Forced Organ Harvesting from Living People in China.”

The 56-page report covers the span of two decades, detailing the origin of and investigations into forced organ harvesting in China, where imprisoned adherents of the spiritual practice Falun Gong have been the main source of organ supply.

A 2019 judgment by an independent people’s tribunal found that the Chinese regime had been killing prisoners of conscience, predominantly detained Falun Gong practitioners, for years on a “significant scale.” The practice, the tribunal said, continues today.

Since whistleblowers from China came forward in 2006, many individuals and organizations have dedicated themselves to raising awareness of forced organ harvesting. DAFOH, a Washington-basesd non-profit organization founded by medical doctors, has provided the medical community and the general public with information about forced organ harvesting for 16 years.

The special report “is a contribution in honor of international Human Rights Day,” Dr. Torsten Trey, executive director of DAFOH, told The Epoch Times on Dec. 10. “Once a year, people bring attention to crimes against humanity past and present. It is a day to appreciate human rights, but also to recall the meaning of human life.”

‘Cold Genocide’

The CCP’s two-decade-long persecution of Falun Gong is a kind of “cold genocide,” the DAFOH report states.

“In most cases, genocide occurs in high intensity in a short period of time, which is also described as a ‘hot genocide.’ In contrast, a cold genocide is carried out over an extended period of time in slow motion, which makes it less detectable and allows for a protracted destruction campaign.”

Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline composed of meditative exercises and a set of moral beliefs centered on the tenets, truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance, shot up in popularity in China during the 1990s, with up to 100 million adherents by the end of the decade. The Chinese regime, deeming this to be a threat, launched a nationwide persecution in 1999 seeking to eliminate the faith group.

The DAFOH special report lists three aspects of the persecution that match the profile of a cold genocide.

First, it is multi-dimensional: the CCP seeks to destroy Falun Gong practitioners physically, psychologically, socially, and spiritually.

Second, the torture and forced organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners are done in secrecy, shielded from the public eye.

Third, the persecution has been normalized in China due to the regime’s disinformation campaigns that have dehumanized and ostracized Falun Gong adherents.

“A cold genocide, though not as easily discerned, is no less a genocide,” the report states.

With forced organ harvesting, the regime found a way to “delegat[e] the method of execution to from the court room to the operating room,” according to DAFOH.

“Forced organ harvesting is a final solution in China’s agenda to destroy the practice of Falun Gong by killing its practitioners,” the report states.

Eyewitness Accounts

The report includes nine witness accounts. One is a whistleblower whose ex-husband participated in harvesting organs from Falun Gong practitioners from 2001 to 2003. Another is a Chinese doctor who performed harvesting of human organs after executions and ultimately defected.

The remaining witnesses are Falun Gong practitioners who were either subjected to torture and forced medical exams while incarcerated, or whose family members were suspected to have been killed in the process of forced organ harvesting.

One of the witnesses is Han Yu, a Falun Gong practitioner whose father was killed and believed to have had his organ harvested while imprisoned for his beliefs in Beijing in 2004.

On June 18, 2004, more than a month after her father’s death, the police allowed the immediate family members to see the remains. No cameras were allowed, and the site was heavily guarded by police. Han saw stitches on her father’s throat area, using very thick black threads. She tried to open the shirt buttons but was stopped by the police.

Then Han’s uncle went in and tore open her father’s shirt. They found that the incision was all the way from the throat to the abdomen. When they pressed the abdomen, they found that his abdomen was stuffed with hard ice.

‘Overwhelming’ Evidence

The DAFOH report addresses a frequent challenge when presenting witness testimonies such as Jiang’s. Critics frequently dismiss such accounts as ‘anecdotal’ or singular cases.

However, a keyword search for specific terms related to medical testing on Minghui.org, a U.S.-based website that reports on the CCP persecution of Falun Gong, reveals “hundreds and thousands of individual testimonies that speak of blood testing, medical exams and threats that organs would be harvested,” the report states. Faced with such a large number of testimonies, “one can no longer consider them ‘anecdotes’ and the testimonies become evidence,” it added.

“Despite the substantial amount of inferential and deduced evidence that has been collected over these years, parliamentarians and journalists often impose the requirement of hard evidence on those who report on forced organ harvesting in China,” according to the report.

“Considering that a totalitarian regime like the CCP will utilize all means to cover up this crime, the available amount of information and evidence is overwhelming.”

‘Lending Falun Gong Our Voice’

The DAFOH report acknowledges that “previous efforts by good-hearted legislators to adopt motions and resolutions” have helped to “raise awareness but did not achieve the effect of stopping the Chinese government from carrying out forced organ harvesting.”

It also suggests a another approach. The CCP’s agenda in persecuting Falun Gong is not merely to wipe out the movement’s adherents, but also to silence it.

“[L]ending Falun Gong our voice and helping Falun Gong practitioners inform the public about their spiritual practice of truthfulness, compassion and tolerance, is the most powerful way to negate the CCP’s purpose of forced organ harvesting,” it states.